The US imposed sanctions on eight North Korean banks and 26 executives on Tuesday, ratcheting up pressure on the country amid increasingly aggressive exchanges with Pyongyang over its nuclear program.
‘This further advances our strategy to fully isolate North Korea in order to achieve our broader objectives of a peaceful and denuclearized Korean peninsula,’ US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a statement.
Tuesday’s announcement compounded economic sanctions which the United Nations unanimously imposed on North Korea after it carried out its latest nuclear weapons test early this month.
The US imposed sanctions on eight North Korean banks and 26 executives on Tuesday, ratcheting up pressure on the country amid increasingly aggressive exchanges with Pyongyang over its nuclear program
The new sanctions target North Koreans working as representatives of North Korean banks in China, Russia, Libya and the United Arab Emirates.
All property and interest of the designated companies and individuals in the US are blocked by the sanctions, effectively freezing them out of much of the global financial system.
The US targeted North Korea’s Foreign Trade Bank and the Central Bank of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea as North Korean government agencies.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, which overseas US sanctions programs, said the Foreign Trade Bank had carried out transactions on behalf of North Korea’s weapons development program.
‘This further advances our strategy to fully isolate North Korea in order to achieve our broader objectives of a peaceful and denuclearized Korean peninsula,’ US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a statement
This came as China said on Wednesday the North Korean nuclear issue should be resolved through dialogue, and that military means were not an option, after U.S. President Donald Trump warned North Korea that any U.S. military option would be ‘devastating’.
Speaking at a daily news briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang reiterated that China has all along upheld the aim of the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and protecting the international nuclear non-proliferation system.
‘At the same we are resolute in working for the protection of the peninsula’s peace and stability and uphold a peaceful resolution for the nuclear issue via dialogue and consultation,’ Lu said.
‘We have always believed that military means should not be an option to resolve the nuclear issue on the peninsula. Because arms cannot resolve the differences and can only cause a bigger disaster. No side can accept this,’ he added.
Tuesday’s announcement compounded economic sanctions which the United Nations unanimously imposed on North Korea after it carried out its latest nuclear weapons test early this month
‘We hope all sides can avoid words and actions that intensify the problem and may cause the situation to continue to escalate.’
The new sanctions also came the same day President Donald Trump ignored pleas to tone down anti-Pyongyang rhetoric, accusing the regime of having tortured a captive US student ‘beyond belief.’
General Joe Dunford, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, testified before lawmakers on Tuesday that for the time being the confrontation with North Korea was more political than military.